1998 Mercury Mystique GS Sport review from North America

I was the proud owner of a 1998 Mercury Mystique GS Sport 2.0lL in line four cylinder manual shift. Got this car after owning a 1985 AMC Renault Alliance. The Renault had so much that needed care that I felt it was a liability, so I put to pasture for retirement. I later invested in the Mystique. I really did not have many problems with the car. When I first bought it, the dealership (not a Ford dealer) told me that I had to have a recall taken care of in the car. I did not realize that the recall was on the fuel tank. I was not able to fill the car up with gas at the convenience store. The car would shut off the pump as if it were full even though the tank was still empty.

A year later, the trunk-release still functioned, but the trunk would not open unless you were there to open it from the back. That was not covered under the warranty that I had, but that was the least of my problems. Later on, the paint on the hood started to oxidize and peel, only to show some rust below. My insurance covered this and did a great job spot-repairing the imperfection for very cheap. The insurance company quoted it to be a $2,000 job, but it only cost me about $400. After that, nothing major happened except for the usual routine of replacing fuses and bulbs.

In the last year of ownership, there would be times that the starter would not even turn the engine over with the turn of the key. This was around the time I was looking for a larger car. It was almost as if the car was jealous. Then the blower motor for the air conditioning / heating unit selectively functioned until I took it to the Ford dealer. I found out that the assembly did have a recall on it. They fixed the whole deal three times, the second time causing some of the wires in the dash board to melt because one of the service men even told me that he had rigged it to work long enough for me to trade the car in. Needless to say, the "rigged" configuration was the one that melted the other wires in the dashboard. The third time, the Ford dealer fixed it and said to never take my car to the other Ford dealer because they were known do doing shady mechanic work. Oddly enough, all of those dealerships had the same owner.

From a mechanical standpoint, the car was phenomenal. I never had a problem with the power train or anything dealing with that. In the three years I owned the car, I only changed the oil twice and she still ran perfectly. I put about 30,000 miles on the car and had not had a problem with the mechanics of it. My only complaint was that the engine lost a significant amount of power when the air conditioner was engaged and while climbing steep hills with the air conditioner on. Other than that, I appreciated the great gas mileage and how wonderful it was in it's sporty appeal to me. I traded this car for a 1999 Oldsmobile Intrigue GL that I later traded for a Mercedes Benz S320.